What happens to the mind during a psychedelic trip? Many contend that the visions people
expereience while under the influence of drugs like, ecstasy, mushrooms, or LSD
are pure fantasy. However, a growing
number of medical professionals would disagree.
“Research projects and pilot studies at Johns Hopkins, Harvard, Purdue
University, and the University of California, Los Angeles are probing into
psychedelic drugs’ mind-altering mysteries and healing powers.” Also, David Presti, who teaches graduate and
undergraduate neuroscience at the University of California Berkeley, asserts
that psychedelics are the best tool for understanding the human ‘capacity for
consciousness.’ (The Second Comingof Psychedelics, Spiritualityhealth.com)
So, not only do these substances aid in understanding how our minds
work, but they also have healing powers for those who suffer from mental
illness. For example, there is a
medicinal tourism route that goes from the US to the jungles of Peru. There, clients seek the help of Shamans who
administer ayahuasca, a powerful hallucinogenic derived form an Amazonian
jungle vine.
Shamans will tell you that during an ayahuasca
cleansing
they’re not working with the contents of a person’s
hallucination but are actually visiting that person in
whatever plane of reality his or her spirit happens to
be.
We are not, they insist, confined to the reality of
our five
senses, but can transcend it and enter a
multidimensional
universe. Peru ; Hell and Back, Newsweek, Kira Salak
Most people in our society associate hallucinogenic drugs
with irresponsible and reckless behavior.
But as it turns out, these substances can be very useful. They can effect powerful healing for
psychiatric conditions, such as PTSD and depression. There are specific parameters that must be observed
for the healing to take place, however.
Most importantly, they must be administered by highly trained
professionals. In the case of the hallucinogenic
ayahuasca, it is the expert shamans who are there and who can intervene. As much healing potential as the drugs possess,
they are also capable of doing a lot of harm if the proper protocol is not
observed. Author of “A Brave New World”
Aldous Huxley, cautioned that psychedelics take users to either “heaven or hell.”
We’ve all heard the cautionary tale
about a bad trip that drives the unlucky neophyte drug user permanently insane. Scare tactics aside, those things really do
happen. The following is what I remember
from my one experience taking mushrooms with an addict boyfriend, Aymeric while on vacation in Amsterdam:
I watched while Aymeric turned
the key in the lock. I blinked on my
normal perception and opened my eyes to see the door had degenerated into a
colorful hologram. Aymeric walked
through it and as I followed, it vaporized.
Once inside the hotel room, I watched the mirrors, along with the framed
pictures, elongate backwards forming endless passageways that led nowhere. Afraid I might get sucked into a strange,
hollowed out world, I dove under the covers.
Aymeric asked me if the drugs were working for me yet, because he was
starting to feel it. I peeked up at him
and was appalled by what I saw. A
sinister smile stretched freakishly far across deeply creased cheeks. Dark oily circles around his eyes were offset
by a grotesquely sallow, jaundiced complexion.
He was hideous. I started to
recoil and to my horror, he sprouted thick red horns, followed by a trident
tail that flicked up beside him.
Panicked, I sat up in bed, pulling the covers up with me, to my
chest. As I looked from him to the bed,
the duvet burst into flames. I screamed
and he laughed, assuming that to be my answer.
I spent the next couple of
hours huddled under the blankets.
Thankfully, the imaginary fire had not been paired with any sensory
hallucinations. Once I realized it
wasn’t real, it disappeared. I had hoped
for a euphoric experience, similar to the high from ecstasy. The shrooms had intensified my thoughts and
feelings to a similar degree, but in the opposite direction. Whereas ecstasy unleashed an abundance of
exhilarating happiness, the shrooms filled me with a hopeless terror. Curled in a fetal ball, I tried to tether my
frantic brain to sanity. I wound one
little thread over and over again through my thoughts. “It will be over soon. It’s not real.” Repeating this mantra was the closest I’d
come to prayer or meditation since childhood.
Mercifully, it worked.
Frightening images jumped out
at me from the colorfully upholstered chairs, from the drapes, from all around
the room. If I let my mind wander for a
moment, I was gripped by all-encompassing fear.
However, as soon as I focused my attention back on my simple meditation,
my faith was restored. Everything would
be ok. My sense of time was also on an
alternate plane than reality. For a while,
each instant felt like an eternity.
Then, thinking that a half hour had gone by, I looked up at the clock to
see that it was midnight, three hours past what I was expecting. I looked over at Aymeric, seated in front of
the TV and I no longer saw an evil devil, but rather a little boy unaware that
he was in mortal danger.
He was watching cartoons. They were in Dutch and as soon as he noticed
that I was sitting up, he excitedly pointed at the screen and informed me, “I
can understand what they are saying!” He
was acting like a little boy. His eyes
were glassy and it appeared that the shrooms had had the opposite effect on
him. Whereas I had been panic-stricken and paralyzed, he had been perfectly
content, watching an animated screen, listening to a foreign language, the way
a baby fondles the mobile in his crib.
He looked just as helpless as I felt, but the difference was that he
surrendered to the drug, while I fought it.
In the article, The
Second Coming of Psychedelics from spiritualityhealth.com, it is noted
that, “while ‘sacred medecine’ may be helpful for someone who was raised in
Native American religious culture, it may prove disastrous for an outsider
unprepared for a mind blowing trip.” My
experience is a testament to the validity of this statement. I was not in any way prepared for, nor was I
accompanied by a trained spiritual healer during, my mushroom trip. Furthermore, my circumstances lacked the
healing rituals associated with a shamanic ayahuasca ceremony. Not surprisingly, I had a very negative and
frightening experience, because I was in a dark place in my life. Fortunately, I was I able to make it through
with prayer and meditation. Since I was
not religious or spiritual at the time, I now attribute this to the grace of a
higher power. Kira Salak writes in Peru, Hell and Back, “All negative
thoughts, shamans believe are dark spirits speaking to us, trying to scare us
into reacting; the spirits then feed on our reactivity, growing stronger and
more formidable until they finally rule over us. This is how addictions and psychological
disorders develop in people.” In this
view, I am lucky to have made it through my harrowing experience without
suffering more psychological damage. I
deflected the negative, scary thoughts by instinctively reverting to prayer and
meditation. If I had not thought to do
that, I don’t know what would have happened, but Salak insinuates in her
article that my intense fear and terrifying thoughts and visions could have
escalated, ultimately locking me in a Hell of my own making.
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